Things have been a little emotionally heavy for me the past few days, so I thought I would lighten it up a bit. I saw this article from a friend on Twitter that highlighted the very first jobs of 10 of the most wealthy people in our country. Have a read. I really got a kick out of it. If there’s one thing I love, it’s people backgrounds and stories to see what got them to their current place.
I’d love to hear what your very first job was. I’ll go first:
I was a teacher assistant for the special ed department at my high school during the summers I was in high school. Also during those summers I was an umpire for (8-11 year old) little league games.
And my wife Brenda’s first job:
At 16 years old she was a clerk to a real estate attorney, and then quickly moved on to Chicago T-Shirt Authority, which made customized “anything you could stick a hot press decal on” (as she says it) paraphernalia. She did that until she went to college.
What was your first job? This should be fun…
Much love.
Just a dude trying to learn how to live and love. 
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
I was a Lifeguard!
I worked at an orchard – trimming trees, picking raspberries, blueberries and apples, polishing apples for sale, and making cider.
At 17, I got a job as dishwasher for Brockle’s Restaurant in Canton, TX. It lasted all of three days until the first Saturday night I had to stay until 2am with my hands in soapy water! I never went back. Then I started playing piano for my church on Sunday mornings. I did that until college.
My first paying job was holding up a sign on a street corner advertising that the local Rite Aid was going out of business. It started the first week of July. I live in the south. I am very white and I wore no sunscreen. Also, I got heckled and pestered by passersby. Learned a lot of new hand symbols in those couple of months…
I worked as a busboy at a B&B in my hometown. http://www.beigermansion.com/ It was run by a couple of great guys who drastically overpaid me.
I washed dishes in a retirement home kitchen after school ’til 8pm weeknights. I lasted until the first quarter report card came out. Then I worked at the local library for awhile, but I was terribly allergic to something in the books (it was probably comical–sneezing and red eyes every evening!). Finally, I got a weekend job at a local real estate firm; answering phones, making appointments, and keeping the office intact. That worked pretty well until I went to college. Those were the days!
Not counting baby-sitting or lawn-mowing, I worked one summer in a little popcorn stand in the middle of Harmony, MN. It was VERY hot in there and I was quite miserable. Plus, it was close to impossible to keep the bugs away. Blech!
Fortunately, I was offered a job as a cook at a now-defunct restaurant called Georgio’s a couple months later.
When I was in Middle School, my uncle owned a cafe downtown. Every saturday morning, I’d go be a busboy and bus the tables from 7 Am to 4 PM. On Sunday afternoons, I’d come in and mop the floors b/c they were closed. Man, this brings backs lots of good memories. Wow, that was a long time ago!
Technically the first job I was hired for was to be a waiter at White River Landing in Muncie, IN, but I quit at orientation when I met the owner. Frightening woman. I stole a fishing pole on my way out.
The first job I actually worked was as a “Courtesy Clerk” (which is fancy terminology for bagger) at a grocery store.
Well it never really hit me until about a year ago of how funny and ironic this was but when I was about 8 years old until I was about 17 my mom worked summers at a Christian camp. She ran the kitchen but also wore many other hats.
It was a great way to grow up and as I got older I did alot of odd jobs working in the kitchen, with the horses and basically having pretty much free reign of the place. Eventually they started paying me like 20 dollars a week which at the time I thought was a fortune.
Now you may be asking yourself what is the big deal about working at a Christian camp? Well here is the funny part. It was an all girls camp. So basically I being a total homo lived out every hetero guys fantasy.
I hope this helps Andrew. Hang in there!
P.S. Maybe I should post this in your questions section. Am I the only one who thinks it is funny that you used to play for a baseball team called the Flames? (Especially since I assume that was still in your Bible banging homophobic days)
LOL to Ryan’s sense of ironic-funny. I started working full time at 15yrs old as a Soph in HS for a local ‘garden-center’ owned by a husband & wife where the husband and his side of the family were from Holland (isn’t that Weird?). I worked there for 6 1/2 yrs which paid for college (mostly). It was a time of outdoors, helping customers, loading trucks, splitting fire-logs and just about all the weeding in the garden-beds that you could image. I was blessed to have met my future wife when her mom came to purchase lots of annuals for her backyard garden. My tennis coach was not pleased when I told him I was getting a full-time job after school (HS was from 7am to Noon). I road my bike from HS to clock-in at work by 1pm. It was classified as an agricultural job so I worked 8hr/day as long as there was work to be done and it wasn’t raining/snowing. Then, I was told to clock-out which meant I would ride my bike back home in the rain usually when it was dark/dusk. Strange how separate and compartmentalized the home, from school and work were. I eventually discovered how I could balance things during the school year and make the neccessary adjustments to my after-school work hours. When I graduated HS, I had saved up enough for at least 2-3 yrs of college.
Ok, so I know this wasn’t a competition or anything, but I have to give out a couple of awards:
Best Ever 1st Job: Has to be Ryan…that is too funny! And yes, it is EXTREMELY ironic that I played Division I baseball as a Bible-banging homophobe for a university with the nickname the Flames. I was a Flamer, for real.
Lucky You Got that Job: Adam! Being drastically overpaid for anything is awesome!!
Hard-knock-life: pm – ouch. Taking one for the team…and by team I mean you paying your way through college working at a garden center. Bonus: You met your wife!
And Mike, seeing I was just in Muncie, IN and went to that restaurant and had the unfortunate pleasure of meeting the owner, I feel you. I wanted to steal a fishing pole on the way out as well.
Oh the places we all come from…And look at us now!
Cashier at a Winn-Dixie grocery store in the days before scanners. . .
McDonalds for two years starting at 16……..yep.
Soda Jerk.
In 1992.
Old time Soda Fountain.
So sad the place closed down.